CBD Is Already Everywhere. How Will the Government Handle It?

The cannabis plant contains more than 100 compounds known as cannabinoids. Of them, one–cannabidiol, or CBD–presents the U.S. with unique potential in public health and business, as well as a good deal of political and legal confusion. That much was clear at the Silver Spring, Md., campus of the Food and Drug Administration on May 31, as over 120 people spoke to a standing-room crowd at the agency’s first public hearing for information about cannabis-derived products–a number that was whittled down by lottery from the 400 who applied to testify. Backers say CBD has health benefits ranging from curing insomnia to relieving joint pain. Those claims remain unproved, but the CBD business in the U.S. has nevertheless tripled in the past three years; analysts project the industry will be worth over $20 billion by 2022. But it occupies a legal gray area: local laws on cannabis apply to the compound, but thanks to hemp-friendly provisions of the 2018 Farm Bill, CBD products are generally legal if they’re derived from hemp from a licensed grower and contain 0.3% or less of THC (a cannabinoid that, unlike CBD, can get you high). The compound can be found in products from gummies to muscle rubs, available online and maybe even at your local bookstore or burger joint. And now the politics seems to be lining up behind it too. The farm lobby has been making its case–some two-thirds of U.S. hemp farming is in service of CBD–and both houses of Congr...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized medicine Source Type: news